World records, heroic stories, tears of the losers. The Olympics are the most important international sporting event when, for two weeks, one city is watched by the world.
Universal enthusiasm and a global media presence politicise the games and provide an opportunity for massive investment. Stadiums become symbols of power. Days of euphoria are followed by disillusionment. Olympic Realities takes the viewer to six places deserted by the Olympic circus. Bruno Helbling’s architecture photography raises questions of the significance of these monstrous events. The impressive pictures are accompanied by six controversial essays, each written by an author with a special connection to the particular Olympic city. Simultaneously provocative and entertaining, they expose the roots of a system of megalomania, corruption and mismanagement.
Olympic Realities is not only a highly aesthetic record of endurance, but also a sharp portrayal of an inescapable recurrence.
Universal enthusiasm and a global media presence politicise the games and provide an opportunity for massive investment. Stadiums become symbols of power. Days of euphoria are followed by disillusionment. Olympic Realities takes the viewer to six places deserted by the Olympic circus. Bruno Helbling’s architecture photography raises questions of the significance of these monstrous events. The impressive pictures are accompanied by six controversial essays, each written by an author with a special connection to the particular Olympic city. Simultaneously provocative and entertaining, they expose the roots of a system of megalomania, corruption and mismanagement.
Olympic Realities is not only a highly aesthetic record of endurance, but also a sharp portrayal of an inescapable recurrence.
Words Peter Dittmann 2015
The west entrance to the Olympic Park in Athens, which is open to the public
In the company of stray dogs at the Olympic Park
The Velodrome
Entrance to the Olympic Village in the north of Athens
Driving lessons in front of the velodrome in the Shijingshan district in Beijing / Security guard at the entrance to the velodrome / The fallow area next to the Olympic Park is the temporary home to a circus
A deserted stadium at the Shunyi rowing facilities in the northeast of Beijing
Indoor training swimming pool in the Olympic Village / Storage room in the gymnasium of the Olympic Village
Russian Plattenbauten, pre-fabricated apartment blocks, on the premises of the Olympic Village
The Olympic stadium in Berlin
The Zetra Olympic Park / A Bosnian tourist at the winners’ rostrum of the ski-jump venue / Concrete bobsleigh track in the Bosnian forest
The Igman Olympic Jumps
The Laura biathlon and cross-country skiing centre
The Olympic Games are above all a media event. One of many broadcasting stations on the Olympic Park’s premises
Young Russian athletes visit the Olympic Park in Adler, Sochi / Railroad tracks, a motorway, a train station and a bus terminal: the landscape and the Mzymta river bed were altered drastically
Parts of the Olympic Village were transformed into indoor markets
The premises of the bobsleigh track in Cesana Pariol / The Palavela ice stadium
Two ski jumps including lifts
OLYMPIC REALITIES
Six Cities after the Games
Hardback, 206 pages, English & German, 164 color-photographs
Photography by Bruno Helbling Essays by Werner van Gent, Peter Dittmann, Ahmed Buric, Francesco Pastorelli, Barbara Lüthi and Martin Müller.
Graphic-Design by Lars Egert
Birkhäuser 2015
Photography by Bruno Helbling Essays by Werner van Gent, Peter Dittmann, Ahmed Buric, Francesco Pastorelli, Barbara Lüthi and Martin Müller.
Graphic-Design by Lars Egert
Birkhäuser 2015
Order signed book or prints (Shop)
Theme: Series about former olympic host cities
Editor: Bruno Helbling
Work: Concept, photography, book-production, exhibition-production
Editor: Bruno Helbling
Work: Concept, photography, book-production, exhibition-production
